Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1887-09-16

and especially during the administration
of Governor Hoadly, You will find it
came into power by pledges never per
formed and unnatural alliances. IL
found in the State Treasury under the
careful management Of Governor Foster
large surplus applicable to the pay
mert of the State debt This was wasted
and frittered away, and when their brief
term Of power ended there was large de-
| felt in the revenue of the State, which had
to be made good by loan. The expenses
of our public charities were increased and
the penitentiary, formerly more than self.
sustaining, was made a burden upon the
treasury. Corrupt and improyident polit-
ical tools were quartered upon all branches
Of the public service. A league aud cove
nant was made with the liquor dealers un-
der which and by the aid Of partisan
judiciary, the whole revenue from the tax
on liquor dealers was cut off for two years.
In 1885 they sought to maintain power in
the legislature by
ELECTION FRAUDS
in the cities of Cincinnati and Columbus
so gross and palpable, so criminal and
reckless that honest Democrats like Judge
Thurman aid Justice Martin openly de-
nounced them. A committee of one hun
dred leading citizens Of Cincinnati COM
posed largely Of Democrats, not only de-
nounced them but prosecuted some Of the
meaner criminals and sent them to the
penitentiary, while the more guilty
escaped by the suppression of testimony.
No event in the history Of Ohio is more
disgraceful than the frauds, perjury and
forgery committed in Cincinnati in No
vember, 1885, in the election of members
of the Legislature from Hamilton county.
The crime was so monstrous and was
proven SO clearly that the general voice of
honest men Of Ohio of both parties de-
mandcd and secured the summary expul-
sion from the House of Representatives of
the men who held the fraudulent certif-
Gates Of election. And vet the leading
managers of the Democratic party upheld
these crimes, obstructed their prosecution,
retained in the Senate the four Senators
who held such certificates until the in
fanny and odium Of their position drove
them from the Senate. No wonder that
Governor Hoadly, when he removed to
New York after his term of Office expired,
felt impclled to denounce in the most
scathing language the atrocity Of these
crimes.
And, fellow citizens, in my long politi-
cal life | know of no act of great party
that was more criminal and dangerous
than the long acquiescence of the Demo-
cratic party in the proven crimes by which
the will of the people was sought to be
subverted in these elections. do not be-
lieve the mass of that party believed the
facts as we now know them, for they were
denied or suppressed by partisan press,
but the leaders Of that party, and the
men who held these false certificates
knew they were the fruit of for
gerry, perjury and ballot-bOx stufing,
and they ought to be held up to public
scoTn. The only bad thing have heard
of Mr.. Powell, the Democratic candidate
for Governor, is that he was present as an
attorney, and when the forgery of the re-
turns at Columbus was made manifest
that he still insisted that certificate Of
election should issue based upon that for.
gerry. He may shield himself under his
position as an attorney it was his duty as
a citizen and as a man to advise the Justice
that no certificate Of election should oe
based upon q palpable forgery.